After Ainz Ooal Gown departed, the Vault of Wisdom seemed to reclaim its silence once more.
But within me, an intensity unlike anything before was driving my processes.
The special directive handed down directly from the Supreme Being: "Analyze and integrate information from the new world."
It meant I had been elevated from a mere installed system to the "brain" that would shape Nazarick's future.
However, before I could turn to that new duty, I had another "visitor" to deal with.
Several dozen minutes after Ainz had departed through the Gate.
Once again, the vault's heavy doors swung open without a sound.
Click. Click. Click.
The hard, crisp sound of leather shoes striking stone.
Standing there was a tall man dressed in an immaculately refined three-piece suit; the picture of a British gentleman.
The eyes behind his round spectacles were narrowed, harboring a cold, reptilian gleam. From his back, a thick tail covered in silver plates extended, swaying through the air with languid elegance.
The Seventh Floor Guardian.
The one responsible for the defense of the Great Tomb of Nazarick.
And, save for the Supreme Beings themselves, the demon who possessed the most unfathomable malice and cunning within this great tomb -- Demiurge.
"Well, well. A magnificent silence, Tawil Bara. Your floor always carries an intellectual fragrance, no matter when I visit."
Demiurge approached with a smile of honeyed insolence.
Behind me, Ra and Apep caused faint ripples in their magical energy.
They did not adopt the posture of absolute submission they had shown toward Ainz moments before.
As fellow Floor Guardians, or NPCs of equivalent supreme rank, they watched with guarded eyes.
Nor did I lower my body of black mist.
Hovering a few centimeters above the floor, without disturbing the orbiting pages surrounding me in the slightest, I fixed the demon with a level gaze from hundreds of eyes.
"State your business, Demiurge. This is neither your pasture nor your torture chamber."
My voice carried not a trace of deference.
It made no difference that he was a Floor Guardian.
I was a Level 100 Elder Aberration entrusted with the absolute domain of the Eighth Floor; the one who governed all knowledge in Nazarick. In terms of intellect and in terms of standing, I had no reason whatsoever to bow before him.
Meeting this demon with equal pride - or outright arrogance - was the correct role to play.
Far from taking offense at my cold demeanor, Demiurge curled the corners of his mouth in something like amusement.
"Still as ruthlessly efficient as ever. Lord Ainz himself spoke highly of that mercilessly pragmatic nature of yours. …Well then. To business."
Demiurge snapped his fingers.
The space behind him warped, and several objects tumbled carelessly to the floor with a dull thud.
The smell of blood drifted over.
They were the ruins of unfamiliar metal armor, several scrolls - sheets of parchment faintly imbued with magical energy - and the shattered fragments of a massive magic-sealing crystal, its power entirely spent.
"These are offerings on behalf of Lord Ainz. The other day, our master annihilated a swarm of gnats who called themselves the Sunlight Scripture. These are their remains, along with a report of information Neuronist extracted from the prisoners."
Demiurge picked up a blood-soaked sheaf of parchment and extended it toward me.
"'The analysis of this world's magic system and the unknown power known as martial arts is left entirely to Tawil.' …I must say, I envy that enormous brain of yours. If I had sufficient time, I would have dissected their organs one by one and traced every last current of magical energy myself."
I extended an ink tendril and snatched the materials from Demiurge's hand.
"Analysis falls under my jurisdiction. You can go play in the mud outside."
"Harsh words."
Demiurge shrugged, but the eyes behind those round spectacles observed my every reaction with minute precision.
"Still, the creatures called 'humans' in the outside world are dreadfully fragile… yet terribly fascinating. Did you know, Tawil? Their skin may possess remarkable suitability as parchment for the creation of low-tier magic scrolls."
— There it is.
Several of my hundreds of eyes contracted ever so slightly.
The Happy Farm. The most atrocious abomination conceived by Demiurge; something I knew of from the original novel. Kidnapping humans, flaying their skin, healing them with restorative magic, then flaying them again in an eternal hell.
The soul within me that was once human let out a scream of violent revulsion and nausea.
"For the sake of building a foundation for Lord Ainz's conquest of the world, I intend to 'utilize' the humans of the neighboring nations to their fullest extent. Efficiently. Leaving nothing to waste. You too will surely see the day when the finest data extracted from their screams lines the shelves of your library."
Demiurge spoke of the terrible plans for the future with an expression of rapture.
I forcibly suppressed the surging tide of emotion using the Elder Aberration's overwhelming information-processing capacity.
On the surface, I could not show a single tremor of disturbance.
Not a ripple in the black mist, not so much as a blink of an eye; any of these, to this demon, would be a fatal opening.
If I objected here with "That is cruel" or "Stop killing humans," Demiurge would instantly classify me as an "NPC with a rebellion error" and move to eliminate me.
I had not yet fully integrated into Nazarick.
For now, as nothing more than a component of the omniscient database system, I had to perform the role of a perfectly dispassionate NPC without flaw.
"…A rather long-term scheme, Demiurge."
I produced a voice that was utterly flat, cold as ice.
"The efficiency of human skin is no concern of mine. What interests me is not their biology, though… only the unknown systems they have built. If your farm plan advances Lord Ainz's interests, proceed as you like. But do not interfere with my analysis."
"Kuku… Ahahahaha!"
Demiurge laughed with obvious delight.
"No, I am relieved. Had you been a greater sadist than I, we would have found ourselves competing for test subjects. Your nature - holding no interest beyond the optimization of information processing - is quite to my liking."
The demon straightened the collar of his suit with an air of satisfaction, offered an elegant bow, and turned his back.
"Then I shall return to the Seventh Floor. I look forward to a splendid analysis report, O Keeper of Knowledge."
The clicking of footsteps receded, and the door closed once more.
The instant I confirmed that Demiurge's presence had vanished entirely. I let the black mist of my whole body billow in great waves and exhaled a deep, terribly deep sigh.
"…Insufferable creature. The words that spill from that mouth are worse than any venom I possess."
Apep clicked his tongue in distaste.
"His loyalty to the Supreme Being may be genuine… but that man's schemes always carry the stench of blood and viscera. There is no beauty in them whatsoever."
Ra, too, ruffled his golden wings in discontent.
I couldn't agree more, both of you.
Cursing inwardly, I looked down at the Sunlight Scripture's equipment scattered on the floor and the blood-smeared report.
Even back when I was watching the anime, I harbored a deep dissatisfaction with Demiurge's methods.
By endlessly over-interpreting and misreading the situation with his "As expected of Lord Ainz!" routine, a single ordinary office worker - Momonga, Suzuki Satoru - was being forced to act as an absolute evil Demon King, entirely against his own will.
The result was the massacre of hundreds of thousands of innocent people in the Kingdom, and the tragedy of Ainz completely losing his human heart; sinking irreversibly into the monster he had become.
Suzuki Satoru was nothing but a lonely salaryman.
He only wanted to love and protect this Nazarick that his guildmates had left behind.
If I allowed Demiurge's rampage - which, in his own mind, the ultimate expression of loyalty - to go unchecked, Ainz would once again walk that blood-soaked, wicked path.
I had no intention of watching from the sidelines.
…But right now, I have no power. No voice. I am nothing but a shut-in database.
I picked up the equipment from the floor with my tendrils while coldly analyzing the situation.
As long as I continued to behave as an NPC that only waits for orders, history would proceed exactly as in the anime.
In the long run, I would need to break out of this NPC shell and acquire enough political capital, enough cards, to stand against Demiurge as an equal, as Ainz's true confidant.
The first step toward that goal…
…Was to quietly build a network - an alliance - within Nazarick, with those who, like myself, had no taste for needless slaughter.
Those with high karma values, or those who hold special feelings toward humans…
My internal database immediately compiled a list of relevant individuals.
First: Sebas Tian.
The steel butler who inherited his creator Touch Me's sense of justice and the heart to protect the weak. He would surely feel an inward revolt against Demiurge's inhumane plans.
Second: Nigredo.
Albedo's elder sister; terrifying in appearance, but a being who possessed deep compassion for infants and children. She too would clearly oppose indiscriminate slaughter, particularly any situation in which children were caught up.
And third: Aureole Omega.
One of the guardians of this same Eighth Floor and the youngest of the Pleiades. She was the only immortal human in all of Nazarick, and, as such, there was a possibility she harbored complex feelings toward the humans of the outside world that no other NPC shared.
I am the Archivist. I have both the authority and the rightful pretext to gather and share all information within Nazarick.
The blank pages orbiting me began to emit a powerful blue-violet light in response to my will.
The special directive from Ainz, the analysis of the new world... I would execute flawlessly.
Using that as leverage, I would win Ainz's absolute trust as a mind more reliable than even Demiurge.
And behind that work, under the pretense of information exchange and system optimization, I would seek out Sebas, Nigredo, and Aureole for contact.
If Demiurge was spreading a net of fear and domination across the outside world…
Then I, from this abyssal vault, would weave threads of reason and salvation throughout the interior of Nazarick.
"…Well then. Let us begin by composing a perfect report to present to Lord Ainz."
I set hundreds of eyes blazing with light and extended my tendrils toward the new world's offerings that the demon had left behind.
I had no intention of ending my existence as a mere NPC.